The automobile represents freedom.
You climb into a car and go, go, go, whenever and wherever you want. The car is modern man’s path to liberty.
Contrast cars with trains.
Railroads are an expression of the collective. Individual identity is erased. You are at the mercy of a government-controlled system that turns citizens into passive cogs, at the mercy of by-the-book bureaucrats.
That’s why democrats/progressives/liberals/ (what are they calling themselves this week?) are obsessed with high-speed rail. The freedom of the road is repellent to big government fanatics. The ruling elite seek to regulate and control tobacco, food, calories, soda, education, light bulbs, toilets, health care, reproduction, cow flatulence, oxygen — every cell of your body.
In short: liberty is constricted by any and all means.
And all in the name of an amorphous, pre-adolescent concept: Fairness.
And you better believe that the chattering elite are the ones who get to define what’s fair and what’s unfair. Funny how that always works out in their favor.
Nazis just adored trains. And hey, the Italian fascists boasted that Mussolini made the trains run on time. Though Italian trains were about as effective and efficient as the Italian army. Which is to say: Not.
At a certain point, one must acknowledge the convergent philosophies of post-modern liberals and iron-fist fascists. Both ideologies assert the power of the state as the final arbiter of human affairs. Hence, the government replaces G-d and family as the center of man’s universe. It’s no surprise that the formal title of the Nazi party was “The National Socialist German Workers’ Party.”
Anyhoo.
Today, Hollywood celebrities make sure to be seen driving a Chevy Volt, Nissan Leaf, or any of the dopey but politically correct green cars. It is something of an open secret here among my Hollywood colleagues that the garage is fully stocked with BMW, Mercedes, Bentley, and for sure, a few Jags—for real driving.
But once upon a time Hollywood produced great stars who proudly posed with their autos, symbols of glamor, affluence, and freedom.
There’s a Pontiac in the first Marilyn Monroe photo? I must have missed it…
Nice dust cover you’ve got up for a prize. I want one. Next contest I’ll get one. The car in the last picture looks like a Texas oil man’s ride of the 30’s.
Neil Hamilton played Tarzan’s competition for Jane in the first two Weissmuller movies, “Tarzan the Ape Man” (1932) and “Tarzan and His Mate” (1934). He was also in “Brewster’s Millions” (1945). An underappreciated character actor — except around here.
Neil Hamilton was a nondescript leading man. Leading man does not mean star, it goes to dramatic type. Leading Lady, Ingenue , Juvenile, Comic, Character actor or actress. These are classic designations used, for example, in the SAG directory to aid casting. In Hamilton’s case, he aged and drank his way from modest success to oblivion before making a comeback on Batman in support. A very dull guy on screen.
I want a hat. But then, I’d have to go to Hollywood in order to achieve the desired antiphon.
But maybe the hat is worth it… Decisions, decisions, decisions…
Nice hat though!
And, apropos of nothing – When “300, the Hangover” comes out, could you please enlighten the rest of us “flies on the wall” as to what the cast of characters at your next production meeting have to say about it? As you did so brilliantly with “300.” Although, I suspect that your inner dialogue (wait – you actually said it, didn’t you…) might be a bit different this time around.
Oh, but I love trains. There is a certain romance to them–Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint sharing a table (and more) in North by Northwest, anything on the Orient Express (well, not so romantic for the murdered). I realize it’s nostalgia, possibly for something that didn’t really exist, but in the back of my mind I still see the trip by train when I was a young girl, watching from the window as it rounded the bend–how exciting it was. Less, so, I would guess, for my mother trying to manage three small children…
Hitchcock liked trains in his movies because the action was restricted in a small place.
For a mother managing three small children, a train is in some ways a better choice than a car, since they can move around. Then again, you can’t make stops to get some air.
I’ll always remember an Amtrak train trip I took from Chicago to NYC about thirty years ago. It was supposed to take about 16 hours; it took about 24. But I did it for the fun of it, so I didn’t much care.
So. What do I get for identifying the 1933 Auburn Boat Tail Speedster accompanying Miss Harlow?
Tsefreedn? 🙂
You get a Seraphic Secret cap!
It appears to be a publicity still from “My Lips Betray” starring Lilian Harvey and El Brendel as the chauffeur, but he’s cut out of this photo.
You can see his portion of the photo and some discussion about the make and model here: http://www.nitrateville.com/viewtopic.php?p=40936
Their guess is a Hispano-Suiza too, but I disagree.
I stand corrected. He is not in your photo, but the end of the bumper is shown, so he wasn’t cropped out. It’s a separate photo.
Look at the shape of the headlights.
Might Lillian’s car be this one?
http://www.forneymuseum.org/FE_HispanoSuiza.html
It looks to me that, whatever the make of the car, the front bumper might be a custom luggage rack. The “stripes” on it look like the straps that go around luggage, and as there appears to be no practical place to carry luggage in that car (certainly not large bags, steamer trunks, etc.), a luggage carrier would seem a very practical add-on. Of course, all else about that car just screams “Practical!”
Excellent.
One of my favorite quotes makes the same point: